Wednesday, October 31, 2007

One of the unfortunate results of my trip to Brussels was that I caught a European cold. Like all other EU productions, this disease has proved to be powerful and effective, and still has me under the weather ten days after the first symptoms set in. It has made it difficult to do my regular job, and raising my fingers to the keyboard to create blog posts has become a Sisyphean task.

Fortunately for me, Mr Smith, who blogs at Mr Smith’s Refusal, has stepped in to cross-post the excellent essay that follows. It’s the latest in his occasional Seeing Things series.

Note: Mr Smith’s opinions are his own, and do not necessarily reflect those of Gates of Vienna.

I was reading this piece at the excellent Brussels Journal (which I will have to add to the blogroll) and had a little thought when I read the following passage:

Fjordman once wrote that the European elites have traded international warfare for civil war at home. The European peoples will not subject themselves to socialist Eurabia indefinitely. The people, betrayed by the actions of their own leadership caste, now find themselves culturally impaired, disarmed, overtaxed, gradually losing their civil liberties, tied-up-and-muzzled in the face of an unending stream of vile abuse, violence, petty crime, ingratitude, insensitivity, and exploitation by tens of millions of Third-World foreigners who should never have been allowed to settle in Europe in the first place.

They will not be satisfied with sullen submission for much longer. Looking in vain for leaders, for political parties that have the courage to state that the Emperor’s new clothes are just tattered figments of utopian insanity, simple-minded people may fall for fringe neo-fascist leaders who, almost alone, seem to see what the townsmen on the street see.

It is the great luck of Europe’s priestly caste that parties like the Vlaams Belang, SVP and BNP exist, for they too see and speak the truth, and provide an alternative that the common folks can join instead of supporting fringe movements that may expound the truth in some ways but spout lunacy ( e.g. “the Jews did it”) in others. If civil wars and Hitler redux are to be avoided in Europe, it will only be because parties like Vlaams Belang have ascended to power and have given a voice and a vent to the suppressed aspirations and anger of many millions. So if Nazi skinheads applaud VB, therein lies the hope that violent sociopaths be transformed into content, enfranchised citizens. It’s no different from MoveOn crazy fringe lefties showing at the Democratic Party’s convention.”

The thought that occurred to me on reading this was, has Paul Weston considered writing on not if Civil War in Europe is inevitable, but if it might be desirable? Mr Weston writes of a possibly inevitable bloodbath on the soil of Europe which, in his words, would make WW2 ‘look like a bun fight’. But, looking at the situation, I begin to wonder if a European civil war would be that bloody, or if having a European civil war would really be so bad.

Let me explain my reasoning. Takuan Seiyo makes an excellent point that “if Nazi skinheads applaud VB, therein lies the hope that violent sociopaths be transformed into content, enfranchised citizens”. Well, I don’t know if Nazi skinheads are violent sociopaths or not, but I do know that JFK was on to something when he said that ‘those who make peaceful revolution impossible, make violent revolution inevitable’. Certainly, there may be those who would say that the Islamification of Europe is a peaceful revolution, but such people would do better bouncing off padded walls than attempting to discuss such matters. Islam is and always has been a baleful, malignant foreign influence in relation to Europe, and a takeover by such a force would not be a revolution, but would be an invasion. In point of fact, it is an invasion.- - - - - - - - -The problem is that the waters are muddied, and badly so. In a paragraph discussing the “the Western white elite’s endless preoccupation with racism and perceived xenophobia”, Takuan Seiyo makes reference to Charles Johnson (of LGF) making a ‘kneejerk overreaction’, presumably this is a reference to Johnson’s lambasting of the BNP in a recent post on LGF. LGF is not, of course, the only counter-jihad blog which runs against the BNP, and that’s the problem. Despite the plentiful evidence that multiculturalism is a failed abomination of a social science experiment, despite the massive evidence that the legacy and activity of the Frankfurt School’s Gramscian Marxism is destroying all Western nations from within, despite the fact that no mainstream political party will touch these issues with a bargepole, otherwise sensible people rant and rail against the BNP and similar parties. And why? Because of some perceived, alleged ‘racism’ or latent ‘fascism’.

There are many issues which could be discussed here, not least of which are the complete lack of definition of the terms ‘racist’ and ‘fascist’ in their contemporary usage, but that would detract too much from the main point here, so that will have to be ‘another story, for another time’. The key thing is that, for a transient (and utterly useless) false sense of moral superiority, even the people with their eyes open to the Islamic threat will jump up and down shouting ‘racist!’, ‘fascist!’ etc, etc, ad nauseam. As tiresome and puerile as this is, it also creates a deeper problem. It ensures that the only political parties with their nation’s best interests in mind will not be elected. For if even those awake to the Islamic threat won’t go to the booths for these parties, what chance that the populace at large will? No, the BNP, the Front National, Vlaams Belang, et al, are highly unlikely to be voted into power in the near future.

This is a massive problem. If the BNP, Front National, etc don’t ascend to power in the way Takuan Seiyo hopes for, then EUrabia is the inevitable consequence, and soon. Recent EU directives have called for millions more immigrants into Europe to make up for the declining native population (for some reason, providing incentives for the indigenous people to reproduce didn’t occur to anyone), and the increased drive for legislation to ‘promote tolerance’ is observable everywhere, from legislation against incitement to ‘homophobia’, to legislation against ‘incitement to religious hatred’ , to proposed legislation to force bloggers to pay taxes and need licenses for blogging . Not to mention existing abuses of legislation to arrest and convict a man of ‘racially motivated disorderly behaviour’ on the basis of no evidence whatsoever, with the only ‘witness’ of an offence alleged to have occurred in public telling the court “I could not swear to the words I did hear”. Whether one subscribes to the Eurabia hypothesis, as I do, or sees the unfurling events as merely the catastrophic and ‘unfortunate’ results of decades of governmental incompetence, there can be no doubt that massive changes are afoot in Europe and the UK. Should these changes succeed in their aims, Europe will be unrecognisable very, very soon.

I find Paul Weston’s view optimistic, myself. Recent events suggest, and suggest strongly, that the fighting spirit of the native European populace in Europe and the UK seems to have waned considerably since the War. How else can one explain the success of the immigrant rape wave of which Fjordman has written, or of the grooming of young girls in the north of England (by immigrant Moslems), or of the takeover of Malmö ? More importantly, how else to explain the fact that the natives have not grown restless to the extent that the locals have rioted? Klein Verzet reported on one such incident, but we all know that a single swallow does not a summer make.

If current trends continue, the completion of the EUrabia project could occur as soon as 2017, and then all is lost. Faced with such a prospect, we can see that if the BNP and co do not ascend to power very soon, they will not ascend at all. Who can say with honesty that they believe the EUSSR/EUrabian superstate which is being fashioned today would allow the existence of such parties in its politics when it is already, in its nascency, instituting and implementing Thought Crime legislation at every opportunity?

A Eurabian EUSSR superstate would bring ‘peace’, no doubt. There are those who justify the EUSSR programme as being a unison of nations against a Nazi resurgence. But the old question appears here: peace at what price? At the price of our nations, our ethnic identities, our cultures, our very souls? No. That is too high a price for too false a prize. I refuse it, and encourage any and all readers to do likewise. Against that evil ‘peace’, I would rather see a good war. Or at least a civil war that isn’t the institutional, condoned, and state-approved abominations of the EUSSR’s Eurabia Project.

One of two things must happen, and that soon, either there must be a victory by a BNP-like party, or there must be civil war. One of those two must occur before 2025, or Europe is lost forever, and the UK with it. (Any British readers who think that the Islamification of the continent will not affect the UK have not been paying attention and are consequently living in a fantasy) This would leave America alone, and if even half of them follow the line that they’d rather take the Moslems over the Europeans, then America won’t last very long either.

But fear and poverty of personality are powerful factors, and are likely to ensure that a BNP-like party will not achieve power in the short time they have left to do so. People would rather be liked than be right, after all, as Stanley Milgram accidentally demonstrated in his Obedience to Authority experiment. Lest we forget, today’s authority (for most) is whatever ersatz morality the mass media manages to persuade the masses to internalise, and chief among the topics for internalisation is a ‘kneejerk overreaction’ to anything with even the faintest hint of ‘racism’ or ‘fascism’, as described but never defined by the mass media and the politicos who control them.

Under such circumstances, I begin to think that civil war in Europe and the UK is something to hope for, rather than fear.

Takuan Seiyo writes that “for the Western white elite’s endless preoccupation with racism and perceived xenophobia, and its worship of tolerance as the supreme virtue is a deep psychosis ...the psychosis leads to a denial of reality; even reality as solidly established through 80 years of statistical research as racial differences of mean IQs, body types, comparative advantages etc. And reality is a jealous mistress. Spurned, she will return to take her revenge ” and is right in this, but in my opinion is only beginning to scratch the surface in the expression of this truth.

The deeper reality is what these 80 years of statistical research reflect, that we are dealing here with races and ideologies separated by hundreds of years of different breeding, learning, and culture. The result is that the differing groups hail from backgrounds as different as if one group had come from Mars, another from Venus, and so on. But an illustrative example is in order. Readers will know from history (or perhaps personal memory) that for a while Germany (and her capital city, Berlin) was split into half, East and West, forming almost a microcosm of the Cold War being played out in the wider world. This split lasted about 40 years, if we take the division of Germany in 1949 as the start date and the formal reunification in 1990 as the end date, which is the blink of an eye in historical terms, yet even as recently as the early 2000s there were still distinct differences in attitudes between the ‘Ossies’ and ‘Wessies’. This is after only 40 years of division, and that within a nation which had been together, with itself, for several hundreds of years. Reunification has not been easy for Germany, and may well not yet be complete.

Contrast that with the EUSSR project to melt all identities down by forcing them into the same pot and you see the greatest attempt in history to wipe out as many races and cultures as possible, which will result in either abortion by way of democratic action (a BNP, Vlaams Belang etc victory) or, worse, catastrophic failure or, which is much, much worse, EUSSR success.

As discussed, a democratic resolution is unlikely, leaving us again with the two options of the EUSSR victory, or all-out civil war in Europe. Of the two, I prefer the latter. We must have, as Kipling said,

‘Freedom for ourselves, and for our sonsAnd failing freedom, war.’

Takuan Seiyo writes that “reality is a jealous mistress. Spurned, she will return to take her revenge ”, but I think Kipling said it best:

”As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of ManThere are only four things certain since Social Progress began.That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world beginsWhen all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A point of slight disagreement with Mr Smith: the Front National is not opposed to Islam per se. The BNP may be a different story, but the FN is no ally of the Counterjihad, as far as I can tell.

Armando Manocchia (on the left) is presenting the award to Bat Ye’or (in the center), with Adriana Bolchini Gaigher looking on (at the right). It was a memorable moment.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Bat Ye’or gave a sobering keynote address at the conference, describing in some detail the process that has created Eurabia, and outlining the ongoing efforts by the EU, the OIC, and various NGOs that are leading inexorably towards the full Islamization of Europe.

The “Eurabia” process is a not a secret one; however, it is not well-known to the general public, because it is buried under cubic acres of official EU working documents, treaties, and declarations of intent. Consider the Islamization of Europe a purloined letter, lying in full view of anyone willing to overcome an aversion to mind-numbing bureauspeak and take a serious look.

Ms. Ye’or has done all the requisite work, and has laid out all the details of what has become known as Eurabia.

Her speech, along with other materials from Brussels, has been posted at Counterjihad Europa. Others will become available as the transcription and conversion of documents is completed. Here is an excerpt:

I will start by a warning: have no illusions. The Eurabia in which we live is solidly established although there are some improvements since the election of Angela Merkel and Nicholas Sarkozy, and also the realization by more and more people that things cannot go on like this. For 40 years Eurabia has built its networks, its finance, its hegemonous power, its totalitarian control over the media, the universities, the culture and the mind of people. If one wants to end this system, one will have to reverse decades of policy…

Eurabia grew within the growth of the European Community (EC) and then the European Union (EU). It was conceived and planned by the European Council and implemented by the European Commission as a supranational policy, linked to the European Community interests and immediate security concerns over terror and energy supplies. The EC correlated a massive Muslim immigration to a strategy of peace and stability in the Mediterranean, hoping that the Euro-Arab symbiosis through economic development, soft diplomacy and multiculturalism would guarantee peace, markets and oil. In the Euro-Arab policy, Muslim immigration is welcomed as an element of a Mediterranean geo-strategy conducted as a partnership with the Arab-Muslim world on the base of pacifism and continual funding and services provided to the Arab world, similar to the subsidies given to the economically underdeveloped EU member-states. The European Investing Bank is the model for the Mediterranean Investing Bank.

This strategy had also an ideological perspective: the refusal of any more war — peace at last by resorting to economic agreements and mutual concessions. However this laudable formula, which succeeded for the integration of Europe, was not adapted to deal with a Muslim world that conceived its international relations only in the framework of jihad. Worst, the Nazi evils came back with a vengeance in the Euro-Arab alliance so similar to the Vichy-Berlin-Arab and Palestinian Nazi and Fascist axis of the thirties and forties against Jews, democracies and America. These evils had not died after World War II, and they reemerged within the Eurabian-Arab Palestinian jihad against Israel.

Let us see how the secret Arafat-EC alliance has transformed Europe. Threatened by Palestinian terrorism in the late 1960s and the 1970s, and by an oil boycott, Europe searched for protection under the wings of those who threatened her. The conditions were: oil and peace for Europe in exchange for a hostile policy toward America and Israel, and most important, European support for Arafat and the PLO, a jihadist and international terrorist movement. Since that moment, Europe entered into the vicious cycle of dhimmitude and self-destruction by justifying jihadism. It developed a culture of hate against America and Israel and paid billions as a security ransom to the Palestinians. Likewise, it opened its gates to massive Muslim immigration according to agreements with the Arab League countries.

This choice of a policy based on fear, ransom and surrender, and on the justification of jihad has blinded Europe to its dangers. Allied with the PLO and the Arab League, the EC denied the threat of global jihadism. This denial, fundamental to Eurabian policy, motivated the appeasement and peaceful surrender to jihadists while pretending that Europe’s enemies were American, but above all, Israel’s policies of resistance to jihad. Hence, Europe transferred onto Israel and America the threat of a terrorist war to which it had already capitulated.

It is “Palestinianism” — the most cherished European ideology because it is the very guaranty of its security against terror — that has determined European support for jihadist tactics. And jihad is not like any war, it represents a whole theological corpus of war, with its holy strategy and ritual tactics of air piracy, terrorism, abductions, beheadings and killings of civilians.

For the Arab and Muslim world, Palestinianism embodies the ideology and aims of jihad against a rebellious dhimmi people. Based on a Muslim culture, history and theology, it denies territorial independence and sovereignty to any non-Muslim people. Such a position is self-defeating for all non-Muslim states, and particularly Europe. Palestinianism is at the root of Europe’s self-destruction. [emphasis added]

The full text of Bat Ye’or’s keynote speech is available here (in pdf format). I recommend that you print and distribute it to anyone you know who thinks “Eurabia” is a paranoid fantasy.

And for those who think America is exempt from all this, bear in mind the “North American Union”. The NAU is also considered a paranoid fantasy by most people, but it is being constructed in the same manner, piecemeal, boring document by boring document. Agreements, protocols, joint understandings, etc. — none of them requires the consent of Congress. They are not secret, but they are never noticed by the public at large, and so never generate any popular counter-pressure on our elected representatives.

Imagine a European Rip Van Winkle, who went to sleep in the 1950s, during the heady days of the “Common Market”, when removing trade barriers was supposedly the only issue. Waking up fifty years later, he discovers that a totalitarian European regime has been imposed from Brussels, without so much as a by-your-leave from the citizens of the nations of Europe.

O Brave New World, indeed!

It begins with the removal of trade barriers. Then comes the talk about “the free flow of goods and people”. Then the “harmonization of laws within the Community”. With PC-Multicultural indoctrination to grease the skids, no one notices until it’s too late. They wake up and find that their God-given rights have evaporated, and decisions are made on their behalf and without their consent by a distant and unaccountable corps of bureaucratic mandarins.

You can’t say Georgetown University isn’t predictable. The nursery for future State Department Hive Workers never strays far from its text, no matter how far it may stray from home.

Thus The Georgetown School of Foreign Service in Qatar has a film series for its faculty this term. And for a Hallowe’en trick-or-treat party they are showing The Situation, purportedly a look at the situation in Iraq post-Saddam. Given what we know about our State Department workers’ general sentiments about things American, the emotional tenor of this film should come as no surprise.

It’s also a pretty lousy movie in general, though it’s the film’s somewhat accusatory Iraq War subject matter that’s getting it some attention — deserved or not — that makes the whole thing a little distasteful.

But to be fair, at least the film is a slight cut above the noxious Samuel L. Jackson vehicle, “Home of the Brave,” another Iraq War drama that was apparently buried by the studio. (If you’d seen it, you’d know why.)

This particular film’s title refers to the suspicious deaths of some Iraqi youths, which has the locals up in arms. U.S. Army troops may have been involved in their deaths, an angle that American journalist Anna Molyneux (Connie Nielsen) is investigating.

Director Philip Haas and screenwriter Wendell Steavenson had some good ideas, but the love triangle concept isn’t one of them. If anything, it makes the wishy-washy Anna less sympathetic, since she continues to string the two men along.

Nielsen’s flat performance doesn’t help, either. But she’s not alone in that regard. John Slattery is one-note as a military commander, as is Said Amadis, who plays a corrupt Iraqi official.

Both characters are stock villains, but this type of material doesn’t need either of them. So instead, Haas and Steavenson wind up undercutting themselves as well as the film.

“The Situation” is not rated but would probably receive an R for strong scenes of war violence (shootings, as well as vehicular and explosive mayhem), strong sexual language (profanity and other suggestive talk), simulated sex, brief gore and slurs based on ethnicity and nationality…

Rotten Tomatoes gives it a 37% rating, which puts it firmly in the “rotten” category. The good reviews come from the usual anti-American suspects, while the rest, like the one above by Jeff Vice of The Desert Morning News (Salt Lake City, Utah) are more firmly in touch with reality.

You can see why the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, no matter where it is located, would choose this for its Hallowe’en horror entertainment.

You can also see why they’ll never show a John Wayne movie at the school in Qatar. However, since the State Department is all about dialogue unto the death, you’d think they’d be running, say, My Dinner with Andre. One reviewer, Coley Smith calls this film, “witty, urbane, original and very dated.” Just like Foggy Bottom!

Boo to them. Somebody should toilet paper the building in keeping with the spirit of the evening.

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

One of the greatest privileges of my life has been to meet Bat Ye’or at the Counterjihad Summit and sit next to her on the dais while she gave the keynote speech. She is small in stature and mild in voice and manner, but she speaks with authority, with a calm assurance born of a mastery of the facts. With full knowledge of the horrifying future that awaits Europe — and the rest of the West — she maintains an equanimity which is an inspiration to us all.

The Italian delegation to the Summit traveled there to give Ms. Ye’or the Oriana Award, in memory of the late Oriana Fallaci. Ms. Ye’or and Ms. Fallaci were friends and frequent correspondents. Bat Ye’or helped her friend in her literary struggle against political Islam by providing her with material from her researches. One of the Italian ladies referred to Ms. Ye’or as “the Muse of Oriana”.

The presentation of the Oriana Award was the most moving moment of the conference.

One of the European attendees at the Counterjihad Summit, angered by the insults hurled at our efforts from several corners of the blogosphere, wrote me this email earlier today:

Charles needs to block himself off from reality completely, to be able to uphold two contradicting things: his photo of Oriana Fallaci on the sidebar of his blog, while doing all in his power to bring down our conference (a conference so bad to him that he considers it a no-brainer that Oriana wouldn’t have attended, and considers it arrogance off-the-scale to even suggest the idea).

Who will tell him about how the memorial fund started by Oriana’s friends handed out the Oriana Award at the conference? To Bat Ye’or. A moment that caused a bit of a problem for a big boy like me, because my eyes were brimming with tears. When Bat told us how Oriana called her late at night when she was soon about to die, I had to bite my lips hard so that I wouldn’t start crying for real. I think so many of us could see ourselves in the desperation of Oriana in that moment.

So what was Bat Ye’or, the idol of Oriana, doing at this conference, when it’s so unthinkable that Oriana (according to Charles) would have attended?

The current witch hunt by Charles and his photo of Oriana in his blog are two things so wildly contradicting that it will tear him apart. The truth is there to be told. He won’t hear it right now, because there’s so much noise in that echo-chamber he has created for himself. But the truth will come out, and will eventually reach even Charles. What will he do? Take down the photo of Oriana as he took down the link to Gates of Vienna?

And now I have to go and find a napkin.

I’ll be writing more later on about Bat Ye’or and the other fine speakers who helped make Counterjihad Brussels 2007 such a great success.

The controversy that has swirled around Counterjihad Brussels 2007 since it ended ten days ago centers on two European nationalist parties, Vlaams Belang, or “Flemish Issue”, and Sverigedemokraterna, or “The Sweden Democrats”. Members of both parties attended the conference, although as individuals, not as representatives of their respective parties.

Sverigedemokraterna acknowledges that in its early years it was home to various neo-Nazi sympathizers and anti-Semites. However, a deliberate reorganization of the party early in this decade purged the neo-Nazis and Jew-haters.

Much of the negative press and disinformation put out about SD arise from questionable sources, mostly leftist and socialist organizations with an indifference to the truth and an axe to grind against Sverigedemokraterna.

Because my knowledge of Swedish politics and history is thin, I rely on my Swedish correspondents for information. I have five or six regular contacts in Sweden, and they all agree: Expo, just to give one example, is not a reliable source of information about Sverigedemokraterna. The Swedes say that Expo habitually lies, misrepresents the truth, and shades information in order to reflect badly on SD. Several Danes who follow Swedish affairs closely say the same thing.

For a good overview of the situation, here is a comment that Magnus, who keeps the Swedish blog Magnus Orerar, left on my earlier post, in response to something Carpenter said. I have corrected some typos and modified his spelling slightly:

Good information! There’s a lot of anti-Semitic stuff going on in the political left too. One thing you didn’t mention is that the Swedish left party in Sweden had a leader in the 1930s, Nils Flygt, who then started a Nazi party in Sweden. Also the left party was pro-Hitler during the Hitler-Churchill conflict (now the morons say Lenin was better than Churchill).

This is no excuse for some anti-Semitic, and also Nazi-influences, in the mainly immigrant-critical Sverigedemokraterna during its first 5-10 years. But that influence never made them a Nazi party! The last 5-10 years they have also actively kicked out politicians (and active members?) with any Nazi connection, whatever it is, and also a large amount of new members (and politicians) in the hugely growing party Sverigedemokraterna in the party are ordinary people; roughly between 10% and 25% of the people in the southern cities vote for them, and in some cities the other non-socialist parties say Sverigedemokraterna is an important party to cooperate with. Many politicians are former politicians in non-socialist parties as Moderaterna (once the “right party”) and Kristdemokraterna.

I don’t think Sverigedemokraterna was even close to what BNP is today ten years ago. Since a party split (I think year 2000/2001) anti-Semitic former SD members started a party (ND) which now isn’t big. That’s a heritage SD has, but former ND members are excluded from membership in SD.

The SD success I think is a natural — and in the point of view of a democracy, sound — response to the lack of immigration critics in all other parties..

I didn’t like any immigration-critical politics until about year 2000/2001, and certainly not Sverigedemokraterna. Its kind of fascist connections in the ’90s was well known. Since then I have come to realize the need of immigration-critical politics. Unlike in many other countries, there is only one immigration-critical party in Sweden, which is Sverigedemokraterna.

Also, critical points of views regarding Swedish immigration politics are more than ever stigmatized by “the political climate”; by other parties. So even if Sverigedemokraterna — now a pro-Israel, pro-Christian and very genuine democratic party — isn’t perfect, it’s anyway a fresh alternative in a dangerous situation of not only cultural but slow political change towards adoption of Islam.

I think it’s naïve of LGF to reject Sverigedemokraterna (SD) on the basis of information from the “anti-racist organization” Expo (which of course can show more than ten-year-old pictures of Nazi friendly persons in SD — although already by then expelled from the party). BTW I’m anti-racist, but Expo has also been influenced by socialist ideology. For example, recently they invited an extreme left violent movement, Anti Fascist Front (AFA) [Antifascisk Aktion or Antifa — BB], to contribute part of an Expo book. They also never confront the racist left or radical Islam.

Expo just a few days ago called any anti-Jihad blog a racist blog which boosts the political violence; LGF included, I suppose… (on TV-4)

I think it’s good if Sverigedemokraterna are monitored regarding fascist connections (which they certainly are, by Expo and others), but there is no point in accusing them of things which are in fact history now. I’m sure Sverigedemokraterna themselves agree on this.

The accusations against Sverigedemokraterna are, based upon what I’ve here described, unfair.

I will be posting more detailed information on SD as it becomes available and when I have time. The volunteers at CVF are busy even now compiling and translating the material.

Personally I’d prefer a warm cycle. Throughout history, Warm is better for agriculture and human prosperity…not to mention the burgeoning wine industry in our area.

But watching Al bundle up is almost as good. By then his hair will be white and his nose will be red, and we can find him a Santa Claus outfit to wear around his tobacco farm:

While politicians and environmentalists worry about the fears of global warming, a growing number of scientists who have studied the effect of the sun on the Earth’s climate have other worries. “The only constant about climate is change..”

In Patterson’s research more than 5,000 years worth of mud was collected from the bottom of Western Canadian fjords using sophisticated technology. Patterson stated the data collected is “one of the highest-quality climate records available.”

Scientific research starting in 2002 is now sparking theories of global cooling. “Solar scientists predict that, by 2020, the sun will be starting into its weakest Schwabe solar cycle of the past two centuries, likely leading to unusually cool conditions onearth.”

Wouldn’t you know it would be those Canadians who would find the evidence.

“This is not going to be a joint venture,” Mr Yastrzhembsky said, underlining “the institute will be monitoring the situation in Europe concerning rights of ethnic minorities, immigrants, media and such”.

Reading between the lines, one gets the feeling that this is about revenge rather than vigilance…- - - - - - - - -

There was apparent confusion around the content of the Russian idea, with Portugal’s prime minister Jose Socrates saying “we received president Putin’s proposal of a Euro-Russian institute dedicated to promoting human rights in the two blocs [Europe and Russia] with satisfaction”.

Mr Socrates, as host of the event, hailed the meeting as “constructive” and said it led to “significant steps toward building a deeper relationship between the EU and Russia” but there was little agreement on substantive issues.

The two sides were unable to bridge their differences on the future status of Kosovo — the breakaway Serb province, with Russia continuing to take a pro-Serb line on the issue having earlier this year blocked a UN plan granting substantial independence for the province.

In addition, talks on a new partnership deal between the two sides were not kicked off, even though the current Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) expires at the end of this year.

And there are other pricklies between Europe and Russia:

There was also no major breakthrough in the field of energy co-operation, a contentious issue for Europe which is heavily reliant on Russia for gas and oil supplies.

Both sides agreed “to keep working to develop a mechanism for early warning on [potential problems with] supplies of energy from Russia to the EU and demand for it”, Russian president Vladimir Putin was quoted as saying by Interfax.

Vlad’s also unhappy with US plans to deploy missile shields in Poland and the Czech Republic.. He said it was analogus to what the USSR did in Cuba in the 1960’s, which led to the Cuban missile crisis.

Well as Heraclitus said, “no man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.”

In this case, the USSR is no more, and despite Putin’s yearnings, it can’t be resurrected. Nor is America the same entity it was during John Kennedy’s time. Now that the KGB files have been opened, the question of Russia’s involvement with Lee Harvey Oswald’s assassination of Kennedy is gaining more traction…

I love the irony of Russia wanting to supervise anyone’s human rights violations. They wrote the book on violating people.

The Danish People’s Party and its election ad campaign involving the new/old Motoon has not escaped the notice of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). The OIC issued this press release a couple of days ago:

PRESS RELASE [sic]

Referring to the hand-drawn picture depicting the Prophet Mohamed, used by the Danish People Party as an electoral campaign material, the OIC observatory on Islamophobia, issued a statement in Jeddah,

Referring to the hand-drawn [“Hand drawn”? What else do we have of ol’ Mo? Photos? — ed.] picture depicting the Prophet Mohamed, used by the Danish People Party as an electoral campaign material, the OIC observatory on Islamophobia, issued a statement in Jeddah, in which it denounced this action, qualifying it as irresponsable [sic] especially as it is emanating from a political party, with the sole aim of inflaming hatred against a sector of the citizens of Denmark. The statement went on to indicate that the short sightedness of this “add” is made apparent through claiming that it is done with the purpose of defending the Danish Values.

The observatory drew the logical conclusion from the “add” that the “Danish Values” are based on giving freehand to hate speeches and on exploiting the noble principle of freedom of expression to insult others while denying the respect of cultural diversity and plurality in modern society.

The Muslim world, while taking note of this unprovoked propensity of some Danish circles to demonize Islam, its figures and symbols remains vigilant and watchful to this trend which might, again, lead to increased tension.

This sounds to me like the first step of the usual sequence of events whenever the outrage of 9.7 octillion Muslims is aroused.

This is The Veiled Threat. Next comes The Demand For Apology, and then The Denial of Responsibility for Violence. The process reaches its dénouement with The Shakedown.

It didn’t work very well with Denmark last time. We’ll see what happens this time.

You may remember that my idea of private funding for Ayaan Hirsi Ali's safety did not get a warm reception. People thought a government should be providing this. I said at the time that it would soon escalate. At what point would governments have to cut off provision of security to private citizens?

Since then, Lars Vilks has moved to a safe house...well, sort of safe. He did allow television cameras to have a look around the neighborhood.

And then there is the blogger from Politically Incorrect, who has been threatened - they were outside his house - and he has gone into hiding also.

There is the potential for many, many more as the EUSSR and the islamistics make the idea of free speech seem criminal.

We just received an email announcing the establishment of a private trust fund dedicated to raising monies for the purpose of providing Ayaan Hirsi Ali with personal security:

The preferred and most immediate way to assist Ms. Hirsi Ali in the financing of her private security protection is through the Ayaan Hirsi Ali Security Trust.

The trust fund can accept both US and international funds and is entirely for the purpose of financing Ms. Hirsi Ali’s security.

Monday, October 29, 2007

In which I attempt to explain the chasm between Americans and the countries of Europe, and respond to the contention that Europeans understand Americans, but not vice versa…

What began as a long comment has morphed into a post.

As a courtesy, comments should rarely exceed three or four paragraphs but, alas, that is a rule I often break as I free associate down the page. As you can see here, verbosity is the main reason we had to set up our own blog and stop hogging others’ bandwidth.

No doubt we made a number of bloggers breathe a sigh of relief when we finally sailed off on our own.

Ioshkafutz —

I think it’s more complicated than you say.

As a first generation American I sometimes feel like a participant observer in the US. But that might have been my natural inclination anyway… people who write tend to have this “observing ego” that notices without let-up.

The last two World Wars damaged Europe badly. John Derbyshire had a recent column in which he looked back on the many spinsters of his childhood in Britain. “Many” because the flower of British manhood had been obliterated and left entombed in Flanders Field.

It was the same for France and Germany, and Spain to some extent in the ’30s.

World War II was wash, rinse, repeat, but with far more damage to the infrastructure of things ancient, things which could not be restored. In fact, some of them ceased to exist even as cultural memories.

In addition, this time the Jewish brain drain, whether by oven or by emigration, left a vacuum in the European intellectual tradition that could not be recovered either.

America lost many men in that war, even though her shores were never breached. But she also had a net gain in her pool of brilliant scientists, especially the Ashkenazi Jews, because Hitler was discarding them and we were picking them up.

This great sea change (as H. Stuart Hughes called it) has had profound effects on both sides of the Atlantic. Meryl Yourish notes that Americans have done it again… American Jews, that is: Three More Jewish Nobel Prize Winners.

These were awards in the field of Economics. In fact, the percentage of American Ashkenazi Jews amongst the Nobel Prize winners in academic areas is truly astounding. Though I do think the Asian and Indian immigrants will catch up and give them a run for their money in the next generation.

The closest America ever came to bloody internecine warfare is our Civil War. Or, as some Southern ladies up until the 1940’s called it, “The Recent Unpleasantness.” The South’s dependence on slave workers and its lack of a middle class was never overcome until the advent of air conditioning. After that, industries in the Northeast began to wither because poor Southerners were willing to work for less, and didn’t believe in unions.

It was America’s first experience in outsourcing.

I don’t think America understands Europe very well. The closest we come is in the South, where bitter memory dies hard.

But I disagree that Europeans somehow understand us — that kind of hubris is what makes Americans turn away. Perhaps Europeans who have spent many years here, who have raised children here… they might, but even then it’s sketchy knowledge at best.

When a couple marries, they bring together two families who may not have much in common. The families are bound together by their children’s union, but that doesn’t make them necessarily decipherable to one another. Which is why parents are relieved when kids marry among “their own.” That’s not racist or nationalist, it’s simply the Law of Gravitas.

My mother said that when she stepped off the boat in New York City, she felt the weight of a thousand years of ghosts drop from her shoulders… but she paid a price for it in feeling alien and alone. Not understood. With her Dublin accent, Southern Americans thought she was… maybe Russian?

When I married the Baron (WASP that he is), my mother joked that it was time for something besides Irish genes in the family. That must have been hard, though: his background was British and German and French. As my mother would say “foreign.”

We have lived almost three decades where we are now. And yet a few years ago, someone told me I was nothing but an “outsider.” Actually, she used the word “foreign.” It was all I could do to keep a straight face. Though I considered our differences serious at the time, I didn’t think they were based on where I was from.

When you say of that we think of Europeans as crappy little people who still believe that God is not just big and awesome but is also in the details, I would demur:- - - - - - - - -Europeans appear to have given up on God altogether. The EU Constitution is a good example of that. So is the fact that the charming Danish people, so full of life and spirit, are required to support their state church but only five percent attend services or express any affiliation. But I could be wrong: perhaps there is even yet the next Søren Kierkegaard lurking in the shadows.

Not that there aren’t exceptions, but it seems to be easier to be open about one’s religious faith in the US than it is in Europe. In fact, that’s one of the reasons we’re ridiculed — we’re so simple-minded and childish for still believing in what the more sophisticated Europeans have long since left behind. Our sophisticated academics are trying to catch up in the rational disbelief department.

In the ’70s I reviewed Jacques Monod’s book Chance and Necessity. To me it seemed so thoroughly post-world wars thinking. In other words, he and his confreres were traumatized and could only say:

… man at last knows that he is alone in the unfeeling immensity of the universe, out of which he emerged only by chance. Neither his destiny nor his duty have been written down. The kingdom above or the darkness below: it is for him to choose.

Many American academics and literati buy that Continental viewpoint. But a majority of the rest of us don’t. And the more physics opens up to uncertainty, the more I understand the faith/doubt dialectic.

That is the dividing line, not America’s failure to understand Europe… on that subject we and Europeans are equally in the dark. We don’t even know what we don’t know about one another.

That is how cultures are.

BTW, I don’t really believe in the concept of “Europeans.” I see Italians, Brits, Danes, Swedish, Spanish, etc. “European” is an EUSSR concept. Even within each country, there are vast differences: the gap between Northern and Southern Italians, between London and Yorkshire, etc. And, of course, Paris as the hub of the Universe. We are all people of a particular place and it is from our experience of belonging that we derive our identity.

On that subject, I suggest Paul Belien’s book, A Throne in Brussels: Britain, the Saxe-Coburgs and the Belgianisation of Europe. Near the end, he says:

Like ‘Europe,’ that other gravy train in Brussels, Belgium has never been based on a sense of national unity. It has been held together by a political class prepared to subvert democracy to its own ends. The Belgian regime, because it could not be based on a real nation, could never tolerate a democratic form of governance. Ironically, in the early 21st century, the Belgian model, the ideal of the 20th century welfare state corporatists, came to fascinate an entirely new group of intellectuals and activists. These so-called ‘neo-Belgicists’ began to sing the praises of Belgium as the world’s first post-modern or post-national nation, unaware that they were actually applauding a post-democratic model…Belgium is characterised by an ‘identity of non-identity.’…without identity and a sense of genuine nationhood, there can also be no democracy and no morality. The neo-Belgicists, however, regard the absence of identity as the supreme morality.

It’s a sad day here at Gates of Vienna. Sometime in the last twenty-four hours, Charles Johnson removed us from his blogroll — his list of “anti-idiotarians” — at Little Green Footballs.

I remember how thrilled Dymphna and I were when we first appeared on Charles’ blogroll. We were still a miniscule blog back then, and being blogrolled by Jihad Watch, LGF, and Wretchard made us as starry-eyed as giddy teenagers.

We’ve become somewhat jaded since those days, but it’s still a sad moment.

I’ve written quite a bit over the last few months about the tendency within the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy to pronounce anathema on one another. If you support the Iraq War, or don’t; if you use the term “moderate Muslim”, or object to it; if you describe the EU as “Eurabia”, or refrain from it: each of these is enough in certain circles to get you bound and cast into the outer darkness. The emotional rhetoric surrounding these excommunications is phenomenal, and people’s energy is sucked into reviling one another instead of fighting the common enemy.

I’m not going to address the specific content of the controversy over Vlaams Belang and Sverigedemokraterna here. We (CVF, that is) have spent the last week or so compiling substantive information, some of which has already been posted at the CVF blog (scroll down) , and other materials from the Brussels conference are available at Counterjihad Europa. Everyone will be free to look at the available information and make his or her own judgment, as I did when I was in Antwerp and Brussels.

One of the unavoidable aspects of building an action coalition is that — assuming you want to be successful, and not simply doctrinally pure — you must form operational alliances with groups or people that you don’t agree with on everything. Any successful politician, academic, or group leader has to do the same.

There is a thousand times more evidence suggesting that U.S. Senator Robert Byrd is a neo-Nazi than there is for Filip Dewinter. But I would ally myself in a heartbeat with Sen. Byrd were he — fat chance — to resolutely oppose the Great Jihad.

One thing I would ask in appeal, in conclusion, is that we avoid what has been called the narcissism of small differences. There are many different ways, different strategies, that we may have, and I find altogether too often that we have this tiny group of people who are aware of the problem, and yet we’re sniping at one another — I’m not speaking of the people in this room — but sniping at one another, and tearing one another down because we don’t have exactly the same program as the other guy.

Well, there’s not time for that. And we need to set aside our own differences, and unite.

This is not the first fight that’s been picked with Gates of Vienna. People occasionally want to fight with us, but as long as they seem to be basically on the same side, we refuse to fight back. We’ll continue to link and support them, despite being reviled by them, and not expect gratitude or reciprocity. We’re in the middle of a crucial and deadly war, and expecting gratitude or reciprocity is a trivial self-indulgence.

I have great respect for Charles Johnson. He has done mighty service on behalf of the Counterjihad. He’s still on our blogroll, and will remain there; I recommend that you visit Little Green Footballs every day so that you can keep up with what’s going on.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Since the start of this kerfuffle, Charles has been banning commenters from LGF. Some of them have been coming over here to discuss what happened, and they are all welcome here. We don’t ban commenters — Blogger doesn’t give us that option, even if we wanted to — and I won’t delete any comments simply because I don’t like them, or disagree with them. As Zionist Youngster said recently:

On my own blog, ever since I first formulated my commenting rules after having my comments deleted on Daily Kos, my policy has been to never delete a comment only because I dislike its content. Feelings of offense are not a legitimate reason to delete comments or ban writers (online) and speakers (in real life). I don’t take this nonsense from anyone — from any political orientation, nationality or religion.

It’s the same at Gates of Vienna: you are entitled to express your opinion. But newcomers should know that there are rules about how you express your opinion here; comments should be civil, temperate, on-topic, and show decorum. To be more specific:

Temperate: No exhortations to commit violence or foment insurrection, etc.

3.

On-topic: We generally don’t delete off-topic comments, but reserve the right to if they are excessively long. A brief OT mention of something you think we should know is perfectly fine.

4.

Decorum: We are a PG-13 blog, because the parents of homeschoolers allow their older children to come over here to further their education. Please make your point without resorting to foul language or explicit descriptions.

These guidelines have encouraged comment threads that are a delight to read, even when I disagree with some of what’s said. We are blessed with intelligent and well-informed commenters, and a distinct lack of trolls.

This has been a nasty business, and I don’t intend to comment on it any further. We will, however, be discussing Vlaams Belang, Sverigedemokraterna, the BNP, and various other anti-jihad political parties in Europe. We’ll examine the available information, draw conclusions, debate with our readers, and sometimes change our minds.

But no one will be excommunicated for supporting one or another of these groups. No one gets pushed away for having a different opinion.

We’ve been expelled from Paradise. We’ll win our bread by the sweat of our brow, as we labor East of Eden against the Great Jihad.

Rankings are based on the following question: Which blogs should one read to be most up to date, i.e., to quickly know about important stories that propagate over the blogosphere? [emphasis added]

Budget=100 blogs: If we can read 100 blogs, which should I read to be most up to date? Unit cost (each blog costs 1 unit), optimizing the information captured (we want to be the first to know about something with many people blogging about the story after us)

Budget=5000 posts: If we can read the total of 5000 posts, which blogs should one read? Cost of reading a blog is the number of posts it has, we optimize the information captured

Multicriterion solution: We want to read both a small number of blogs and a small number of posts. These results are from the experiment on figure 4(a) from the paper. We find the right budget where value of objective function is 40%. Cost of a blog is a combination of a number of posts (NP) a blog has plus a constant (UC).

Here is their real-life comparison:

The spread of information in the blogosphere: First blog writes a post and then other blogs refer to it. The behavior (information) spreads (cascades) through the network of blogs.

Water distribution networks

[The] same techniques and algorithms as used for blogs also apply to detecting disease outbreaks in water distribution networks. Consider a city water distribution network, delivering water to households via pipes and junctions. Intrusions can cause contaminants to spread over the network, and we want to select a few locations (pipe junctions) to install sensors, in order to detect these contaminations as quickly as possible.

The sensor placements obtained by our algorithm are provably near optimal, providing a constant fraction of the optimal solution. Our approach scales, achieving speedups and savings in storage of several orders of magnitude.

This same link also provides their algorithm and some illustrations, plus links to more detailed information. Don't know that I care for being compard to contaminated water, however. Couldn't they have done something with, say, ice cream?

This is the .pdf of their paper, with illustrations of how the cascades work.

But what is surprising is the list they came up with. Of course, #1 is no surprise at all -Instapundit, of course. But after that, it’s up for grabs:

Here’s some data regarding the parameters of their table:

Top 100 blogs for unit cost case and PA objective function

PA score : score for the solution of length k

NP : number of posts of a blog in 2006

IL : number of inlinks that a blog got from other blogs inside the dataset in 2006

OLO : number of outlinks to other blogs in the dataset

OLA : number of all outlinks (also counting links other resources on the web)

The table is below the fold. You’re going to be surprised at some of the blogs that made the list, and some that are noticeably absent.- - - - - - - - -

“if there’s a best day to read blogs to maximize the information your getting, it’s Friday.”

Who has time to read blogs on Friday? Must be an anti-Semitic algorithm!

“if you only have time to read 100 blogs”

Who on earth has time to read 100 blogs?

Why, bloggers have the time, Mr. Zman Biur.

And commenters also, who like to hang around and share their thoughts but don’t want to deal with the upkeep of a blog. It’s kind of like letting your neighbors kids in to play occasionally because they like your neat “stuff”, but you can send them home when you feel like it.

What I did notice however, was that study said the best time to read blogs is on Friday. It’s been my experience our traffic drops off then. First, lots of people skip work on Friday. Second, we must have more Jewish readers getting ready for Shabbat than I realized.

Cool!

NOTE: I recognize that being on this list does not mean we're actually in the top 100 in virtual reality. What these students were establishing was the most efficient way to use your blog-reading time. That's what this list signifies.